当代东亚儒学的主要课题与研究进路

对当代(新)儒家和宋明理学家而言,儒学不仅仅是儒学研究。他们认为儒家的终极教义是要寻求某种内在智慧和超越真理,这是客观研究和逻辑方法所不能理解的。他们强调,中西哲学有着本质不同,两者不能互相通约。与宋明儒家一样,大多数当代(新)儒学的第一代代表人物运用佛教的概念架构来建构其理论。然而,由于第二代的主要人物受过良好的西方哲学训练,他们常常借用西方唯心论者如康德和黑格尔的观念来重建儒家古典学说。与这种哲学的或形上的进路相比,日本儒学的进路自伊藤仁斋与荻生徂徕以来基本上是语言学的和历史学的。除了揭示内在的超越领域外,当代(新)儒家还必须处理外在世界的问题。前者他们称之为“内圣”,而后者则称之为“外王”。由此乃引出“韦伯式论旨”的问题。本文的主要目的是要探讨当代新儒学兴起的历史背景,揭示其主要课题,及审视当代儒学研究的各种进路和方法。本文的结论是:当代新儒学的规划在哲学论证上是不确当的,虽然其历史意义是不容抹煞的。

Contemporary Confucianism in East Asia

For contemporary Neo-Confucians as well as traditional Neo-Confucians (i.e. Song-Ming Confucians), Confucianism is more than Confucian studies. They thought that Confucian teaching is some kind of practical wisdom and transcendental truth which cannot be understood by any objective and logical methods. They stressed that there is some kind of essential difference between Chinese philosophy and Western philosophy in the sense that they are incommensurable to each other. They also stressed that to understand this wisdom and truth is the same as to enter into a realm of transcendental experience which can only be accessed by some kind of intellectual or mystical intuition after doing a series of difficult and serious moral practices. Just like the Song-Ming Confucians, most of the representatives of the first generation of contemporary Neo-Confucianism used Buddhist conceptual scheme to construct their theory. However, since the main figures of the second generation had well trained in Western philosophy, they often borrowed ideas from the Western idealists such as Kant and Hegel to reconstruct the ancient teaching. Besides disclosing the internal transcendental realm, contemporary Neo-Confucianism has to deal with the problem in the outside world. The former is what the ancient Confucians call by "sageliness within" and the latter is "kingliness without". In other words, in addition to cultivating oneself into an ideal person with the moral experience in the ultimate and transcendental realm, one has to open up a channel from internal to external through which the ideal can be materialized in social practice. Contemporary Neo-Confucians do think that their ideal is not only functioned in making individual's well-being in terms of morality, but also functioned in making society in a good order.